‘It was a high-quality player pool’ – Saurabh Netravalkar on going unsold in IPL 2025 mega auction

Saurabh Netravalkar, the star left-arm bowler for the United States of America (USA), recently revealed that he was not sold at the IPL 2025 Mega Auction. The 33-year-old also talked about how it made him feel to be on the shortlist and to have his name called out at the ceremony. Additionally, he explained why the clubs were not interested in him for one of the most important franchise cricket events.

Cricket fans and analysts were taken aback by the 2025 IPL super auction when some of the best players were unable to attract offers and ultimately went unsold. David Warner and Shardul Thakur, who was formerly among the most sought-after players in the Indian Premier League (IPL), were among the well-known names on the list of unsold players.

As a result, Saurabh Netravalkar, a rising star who received a lot of attention for his outstanding achievements for the USA squad in the 2024 T20 World Cup, went unnoticed in the process. As a result, Netravalkar’s sale was anticipated. It wasn’t meant to be, though, and he talked candidly about the IPL big auction and how he didn’t sell.

Saurabh said he was grateful to have been shortlisted in the first place and that it was much more satisfying to have his name called out. After not making the cut, the bowler explained that it was understandable that he was not sold at the IPL super auction because many other prominent players were also unsold, making the total player pool too large for the teams to handle.

“First of all, thank you for making the final auction list shortlist. Yes, there was definitely hope in the child in me! However, there were a lot of elite players in the pool who didn’t make the cut, so I totally understand,” Netravalkar told the Times of India (TOI).

During the T20 World Cup, Saurabh Netravalkar demonstrated his abilities.

Despite the fact that the USA is not among the top teams in international cricket, Netravalkar has excelled in both white-ball and white-ball forms and is now the team’s top wicket-taker. Most notably, Netravalkar was one of the standout players with the ball as the USA defeated Pakistan in the 2024 T20 World Cup. For the uninitiated, Netravalkar had only given up 18 runs out of his allotted four overs. He also claimed two wickets during his tenure.

Furthermore, in terms of overall experience, the 33-year-old has claimed 51 wickets in T20 matches and 88 wickets in ODIs. It is interesting to learn from these statistics that none of the franchises made an offer for him.